Pastoral Populations Research Articles

Agricultural and non‐agricultural settlements for drought‐afflicted pastoralists in Somalia

The severe drought of 1973–1975 in Somalia had major impacts on pastoral populations, many of whom moved into specially established camps where food, water and medical assistance were provided by the government and international agencies. At the end of the drought it was decided to settle the remaining 120,000 people in six settlements, three of which were agricultural and three oriented towards fishing. This paper analyzes these settlements, with particular attention paid to agricultural systems, organization and socioeconomic characteristics. Some of the problems facing the settlements included their location, administrative structure and relative overemphasis on social services as opposed to development of production and income generating activities. It is shown that the socioeconomic viability of settlements would be enhanced if careful studies were undertaken beforehand and if a diversified development strategy were employed.

Demographic Factors in Resource Depletion and Environmental Degradation in East African Rangeland

rangelands represent the major land resource in most developing countries. Characterized by low and uncertain levels of rainfall, high desiccating factors, and periodic drought, these uncultivated lands can be grazed and browsed by both wild and domestic animals. In the developing countries of Africa, rangelands comprise over half the land area and support a large human population who are dependent, in one way or another, on grazing livestock. The livestock account for a significant percentage of the gross domestic product of these countries. These lands also produce forage for wildlife and are an important source of critical fuelwood, which provides the energy source for around 80 percent of the African population. In most African rangelands, livestock grazing and at times wildlife use represent the only existing possibilities for support of human populations. Most of the attention focused on the effects of human population increase in developing countries is directed to urban centers and farming areas. Yet demographic pressures affect rangeland areas with at least equal intensity, and in the rangelands the critical relationships among population increase, environmental degradation, and human welfare are much more dramatically evident. The growth of human populations affects arid and semiarid rangelands in two ways: The first involves increases in the size of the pastoral populations themselves-those who live on the rangelands and are directly dependent upon the grazing resource. The carrying capacity of these lands for people is directly related to their carrying capacity for livestock. Increased numbers of people lead to increased numbers of livestock, which, in turn, lead to overgrazing, degradation of the range resource, and ultimate reduction of the ability of these

A comparative demographic study of three Sahelian populations : marriage and child care as intermediate determinants of fertility and mortality.

The literature on the demography of pastoral populations tends to consider pastor~lism as an independent determinant of the levels and patterns of fertility ~nd mortality. Despite a general lack of adequate data, there is a preoccupation with the low fertility of pastoral populations. Demographic data are presented for three Malian populations: sedentary Bambara cuI ti vators and tw·o Kel Tamasheq groups of nomadic pastoralists. These populations are compared and contrasted and internal social class differentials are examined. Bambara have higher fertility than the two pastoral populations and all three groups have different patterns of mortality. Child mortality levels vary significantly between Kel Tamasheq social classes. An examination of the intermediate determinants of fertility identifies marriage as the most important differentiating factor. For mortality a similar approach is unable to identify any particular intermediate variable as the dominant· determinant of the observed patterns. The principal mortality differentials occur, however. within the pastoral populations, where high status, rich social classes have higher child mortality than poor, low status ex-slaves. Intensive, qualitative studies of marriage and social class variation show that although the pastoral Kel Tamasheq are demographically different· from the Bambara, these differences are caused as much by socio-cultural factors as by economic ones. Kel Tamasheq kinship, household formation patterns and the importance of prestige and status mean that women may spend many of their childbearing years between marriages, either divorced or widmved. This contrasts with the Bambara pattern of continuous marriage maintained through 1m di vorce 2. a tes, polygyny and v.~idO\v inheritance, vhere much status a~j wealth is acquired through having children. The same socio-cultural factors create variation in Tamasheq child care patterns. Social constraints on high status mothers operate in the opposite direction from ecor:ornic constraints, producing unexpected patterns of social class mortality differentials. The study concludes that nomadic pastoralists are not demograp~ically different from cultivating populations because of their production system. To understand why the observed differences do occur, intensive qualitative studies are needed to supplement and explain the quantitative data.

Nutritional situation and seasonal variations for pastoralist populations of the sahel (Senegalese Ferlo)

The nutritional status and food consumption of a population of herders in the Ferlo (Senegal) was studied during a complete seasonal cycle. The Ferlo region is in the Sahelian climatic belt where a long dry season (nine to ten months) alternates with a brief humid season (two to three months). In the existing traditional livestock production system, these climatic variations have an impact first on the living conditions of these people but also on the nutritional status of the herders. Food intakes are insufficient during the rains and one finds a deep nutritional depression during this period; whereas during the dry season, to the contrary, food intake is very good and the nutritional status definitely improves. In an average situation, there is a balance between the losses that occurred during the wet season and the gains at the beginning of the dry season. This balance is nevertheless very precarious. To insure food and nutritional security for the herders, activities must concentrate on seeking solutions

The Crafts of the Uzbeks of Southern Khorezm in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries (A Historical-Ethnographic Sketch) [Part III

One of the most important branches of craft production in Khorezm in the period under examination was tanning. It was centered chiefly in Khanki, Urgench, and Khiva. This craft processed an enormous quantity of raw materials, delivered primarily by the pastoral population. According to a questionnaire survey taken in the first years after the Khorezmian Revolution (up to 1923), there were about 300 tanning diukans [Uzbek craftsman's workshop or place of business]. (1) Nearly a quarter of them were in Khanki Raion. (2)

The Role of the State in Peasant-Nomad Mutualism

Patterns of mutual land use between ethnically distinct nomadic pastoral and sedentary agricultural populations occur in some areas of the Near East. The niches occupied by such groups may appear to be non-competitive in that different seasonal schedules of land use and different modes of production permit the joint exploitation of common territory. However, such land use relationships are inherently unstable because the limits of the political economy of either ethnically defined mode of production are rarely coterminous with the distribution of the resources a population could exploit if it had access to them. Therefore, it is contended that peasant-nomad expressions of land-use mutualism and symbiotic exchange are best viewed as a function of a balance of power, and not as the result of the exploitation of intrinsically ,non-competitive niches. In the Near East, the state, by interfering in these power relations even beyond the limits of its full sovereignty, is often a more critical factor in determining land use relations than the local ecology.

The Southern Margin of the Sahara: Comments on Some Recent Studies on the Question of Desiccation in West Africa

W 5 jrITH these words Professor E. P. Stebbing introduces important problem that he has recently discussed in several papers and a book.2 Professor Stebbing is head of Department of Forestry in University of Edinburgh and was formerly on Indian Forest Service. In 1934 he paid an extended visit to West Africa, in course of which he made a comparative study of forestry work in British and French areas. He was particularly interested in savana or bush forests of lower areas and soon formed opinion that increasing desiccation was causing a rapid southward movement of Saharan margin, a movement that threatens to spread even to coast and thus to destroy completely prosperity of West Africa. Certain remedial measures-the establishment, or preservation, of two parallel forest belts-were proposed; but Professor Stebbing was wise enough to say3 that the true facts on subject of present advance southwards and threat of Sahara can be substantiated in one way onlyby appointment of a small Commission of officers carefully selected for their knowledge of local conditions on both sides of frontier. Such a commission, consisting of one senior British administrator and one French, two British Nigerian foresters and one geologist, and two Inspectors of Forests and Water Supply of French West Africa, was appointed in 1936 and published its report in 1937. The Report itself is a slight document,4 but fortunately observations and views of four of. technical members have been published elsewhere, in readily accessible journals. In particular scholarly and well documented paper of geologist, Brynmor Jones,5 is far more informative than Report itself. The Report was unanimous, and in general Commission failed to find evidence in support of Stebbing's gloomy predictions. In his later papers6 Stebbing has had these contrary views to consider and, although refusing to accept Commission's findings, seems to have shifted his viewpoint, arguing that agricultural and pastoral developments and population increase in West Africa are causing a greater pressure on land and inducing land spoliation and soil erosion. What he now calls intermittent rainfall is regarded as cause of supposed desiccation.